Day seven: Isaac and I woke up early, said a big goodbye and thank you to Ava, and made our way to the train station for the two hour trip to Chengdu, a small city to the north-west. The train ride was a breeze (everything is so cheap for foreigners that we opted for first-class seats), and Vivian (Isaac's friend) was nice enough to meet us at the station once we arrived and drive us to our hotel.
Something I found on a brochure at the train station. I thought it was rather appropriate for the moment =) |
My poor attempt to try and take an 'artistic' looking photo. |
These guys looked great! |
Taken from our seats. Such a peaceful setting. |
Shame about the picture quality. |
I really love haggling with shop keepers, I don't know why but I find it to be so much fun. With the language barrier it became more of a challenge which only fueled my enjoyment. Soon enough I had a few gifts under my arms, but still had about 6 people left to buy for that I just couldn't find anything for. That was until I met this awesome old guy!
He would of been about 60 years old and if you provide him a name (in Chinese) he would paint on the spot these beautiful calligraphy portraits that represents a message of well-wishes and include the name as well. And luckily for me as soon as he heard me greet him and ask him some questions in Chinese, his eyes lit up with surprise and was immediately my fan, win!
The level of detail with just a paintbrush was impressive! |
Interestingly while walking around this market I seen heaps of foreigners (around twenty or so), something I hadn't expected to see what so ever, especially because Chengdu seems even more remote than Chongqing and in Chongqing the day before I had only seen two my entire time there. I didn't say hello to any of them, partly because I thought it was a little too cliche' (Hi, another foreigner, cool, let's form a club) and secondly I wasn't sure if they spoke English (most seemed European). It was a very unique experience to be able to watch how people from countries other than my own (Australia) interact and carry themselves amongst the Chinese.
Alas with my bag full of gifts and my wallet emptied of money it was time to head home. We had dinner together with Vivian that night (she didn't talk to me much, I think she was shy) at a Pizza Hut (while I do thoroughly enjoy Chinese food, it is all we had eaten all week so it is nice to have some Western food to mix it up).
Isaac challenged me to eat this entire pizza by myself. I won! |
Day eight: About 1am in the morning I deeply regretted accepting Isaac's challenge to eat the whole pizza... my stomach was on fire haha! Thankfully it passed and I fell back to sleep. About 10am we both awoke, checked out of the hotel, met up with Vivian again and went out for breakfast/lunch at a nearby restaurant.
I was a little nervous that day. Why? Because for the next day and a half I would be on my own in my travels here in China. That afternoon I had a flight to take myself to Shanghai, and the following day I had another flight to take me from Shanghai back home to Australia and with Isaac staying in China for the next few months over summer he obviously wouldn't be joining me any further than we currently were. We spent a while organizing how I was to be catching flights, directing taxi's and booking into hotels without Isaac with me to translate.
On our drive to the airport I was thinking about how my next day and a half would go on my own, reiterating through my head all the Chinese words I knew. I wasn't too worried as I knew a lot of people in Shanghai speak English (especially at airports and hotels) so that was fine, and Isaac would be with me at Chengdu airport to see me off so if I ran into any problems he could come rescue me. No worries!
Or so I thought...
Part eight here. Let's see how my time alone went...
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